


Nothing Is Impossible

by invisible_doorknob



Category: Ladyhawke (1985)
Genre: F/M, Non-graphic character death, Post-Movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-21 09:51:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,069
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19999981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/invisible_doorknob/pseuds/invisible_doorknob
Summary: Long after the curse's breaking, Philippe reflects.





	Nothing Is Impossible

It was, Philippe thought, a lovely day to die.

He lay back in the long grass, its bending blades tickling his skin with each cool breath of wind, and watched the sky. Wide, wide, that peculiar deep blue known only on summer days at the cusp of evening, with huge white clouds sailing past...sun, shadow, sun.

Isabeau and Navarre had come a long way from the mountains and forests of Philippe’s youth, to a land of mist and rain and green, of endless forest and sweet-smelling hills. They had chosen to settle far from their troubled past; and many years had ripened and died before Philippe had sought them out.

He folded his hands beneath his head and blinked slowly at the sky, at the memories. Father Imperius had been right to pull Philippe away, that blood-soaked, joy-drenched day-and-night so long ago; Isabeau’s glorious beauty and courage had been far too much for his callow heart, and he would have dashed it to pieces on the unbreakable rock of her love for Navarre, and his for her.

To be sure, the good father had found ways to occupy Philippe’s time until the yearning eased. Atonement done, Imperius had rejoined the cleansed brotherhood he’d left behind, and for a time Philippe had almost been tempted to take the vows himself. But there was no place in a monastery for someone so inclined to argument, and his conversations with God made the abbot frown and cross himself.

So Philippe had gone back out into the world, richer by a purse from Isabeau’s restored wealth and a story he could tell for a hundred years and never be believed.

That didn’t matter, though; he had _seen_ it. He still bore the scars, faint and silvery across his chest, and in a wistful mood he imagined he could still feel the kiss Isabeau had pressed to his brow, or the rough embrace of Navarre’s farewell.

He’d been a thief again, Philippe had, but also a carter, a laborer, a merchant of small goods, even briefly a soldier. He had gone where life and Fortune took him, sometimes up, sometimes down. He had loved, too, from time to time, but no woman had won his heart enough to keep him.

Life could be lonely, and often hard, but it was _interesting_.

Philippe sighed and plucked a blade of grass to chew. He’d come to this cool land twice before; once to visit his friends in the town where they’d made their home--and a right royal welcome they’d given him--and once to escort Imperius to Navarre’s bedside.

The old man had been nearly blind by then, and feeble, but his wits had still been sharp, and he’d taken Navarre’s last confession and bestowed the last absolution without hesitation. Philippe still winced at the memory of Isabeau’s face when her husband’s eyes closed for the final time.

But they’d had almost thirty years together, and three children grown. Philippe had stayed to offer what silent comfort he could until Imperius could travel again, stayed long enough to hear the rumours of the new ghost haunting the grounds of the keep Isabeau and Navarre had made their own.

_A wolf,_ people said, though the island’s last wolf had been slain more than a century before. _A great wolf, black as night and as silent._

They’d never spoken of it, the three of them. But Philippe had seen the new lines graven in Isabeau’s face ease a little, before he and Imperius had taken their leave.

The old man had followed Navarre into death not long after, leaving Philippe with a crusty admonishment about Heaven and a blessing of his own. And life had gone on.

He tossed the blade aside and stretched his toes in his shoes. He’d only meant to visit, this time, but Isabeau had smiled and insisted he stay. She was more beautiful than ever, Philippe thought; honed and tempered by time and loss, still with the grace of a cat and the eyes of a bird. _And the sharp wit of a courtier_ , he thought; but it made his throat thicken with tears.

Because that very morning, she had taken four steps across her solar, and at the fifth had fallen like an axe-struck birch. Her ladies had taken her up and borne her to her chamber, but she did not awaken, and Philippe had seen what sat on her brow and hovered over her lips.

_She feels no pain. It’s a good way to die. A good day to die._ The cool and windy day, the open sky--it all seemed to lay a fair road up towards those far-off gates and their gemmed walls.

He’d imagined it a thousand times, what lock might bind it, though his wayward mind often veered to the precious stones and how he might pry a few loose--surely Heaven had enough to spare. But now Philippe laid such thoughts aside, and prayed as hard as he could. Hell had failed to part the lovers; could Heaven do less than reunite them?

His eyes ached at the whiteness of the clouds, high-piled, fantastic shapes. Philippe saw nothing that looked like a city, but one did seem to be stretching out, wisps trailing back almost like limbs...and a tail…

He heard the call, faint and high and pure, unknown in this land but as familiar as his own whistle. Philippe caught the flash of wings as the hawk climbed, higher and higher into the deepening blue. He strained to follow it, eyes watering, and it was a blur against the cloud, a mote, gone.

He squeezed his lids closed, and felt the tears spill out as the keep’s bell began to toll.

* * *

The clouds were gone and the stars were salting the sky before Philippe pushed to his feet, stiffly now as age crept up on him. “It’s just you and me now, God,” he murmured, scrubbing his face with his hands. “Just like in the beginning.”

For an instant, he seemed to see them, two figures with their arms linked, smiling in a garden; and a man no longer old but timeless, face lifted towards the light.

_And the gates of it shall not be shut at all,_ said a laughing, familiar Voice, not in his ear but in his heart.

Philippe sighed, and smiled, and began the long walk home.

~End~

**Author's Note:**

> Revelation 21:25


End file.
